Michael Zager Band - Let's All Chant: Michael Zager Dance Coll
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Artist: Michael Zager BandPerformer: Cissy Houston
Performer: Johnny "Guitar" Watson
Performer: Peabo Bryson
Performer: Deniece Williams
Performer: Luther Vandross
Performer: Whitney Houston
Edition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 1997-03-11
Music Label: Varese Sarabande
Soundtracks:
- Let's All Chant
- Think It Over - Cissy Houston
- Traffic Jam
- Do It With Feeling
- The Planet Funk - Johnny Guitar Watson
- Love Express
- Doctor Rhythm
- Time Heals Every Wound
- Life's A Party
- What's Your Name, What's Your Number - The Andrea True Connection
- Don't Sneak On Me (Disco Version)
Music reviews of Let's All Chant: Michael Zager Dance Coll
Music Review: A Nice Sampling Of The Musical Style Favoured In The Late 70s/Early 80s
Rating: 5 Stars
Despite the so-so reviews before mine, this isn't a bad production out of Varese Vintage. The sound quality is excellent, and it comes with informative liner notes written by singer/songwriter/producer Mike Ragogna. If there's a fault - and I can't be my usual critical self in this regard since it doesn't claim to be "the greatest hits of" or "the best of" The Michael Zager Band - it's that they present the 12" 7:02 version of his biggest hit, Let's All Chant, rather than the hit single rendition which runs around 3:00 minutes, nor does it include the B-side to his only other hit, Do It With Feeling.
That came out in the spring of 1976 on Bang 720 billed as Michael Zager's Moon Band With Peabo Bryson, and reached # 25 R&B and # 94 Billboard Pop Hot 100. The flipside, missing here, was This Is The Life, and that does not seem to be anywhere in CD format. In a 1978 re-release on Bang 737, the A-side charted again at # 76 R&B in June/July. Sandwiched in between was his biggest hit, Let's All Chant which, billed to The Michael Zager Band, peaked at # 15 R&B/# 36 Hot 100 in March/April 1978 on Private Stock 45,184 b/w Love Express.
Although those would be his only hit singles Zager, born on January 3, 1943 in Passaic, New Jersey, is perhaps best known as a composer, arranger and, not least, as an award-winning producer of material for some of the biggest names in the industry. In addition to the above-mentioned Bryson, there was Johnny "Guitar" Watson, whose 1982 # 62 R&B hit The Planet Funk is here, Cissy Houston, whose 1978 # 32 R&B/# 106 Hot 100 "Bubble Under" hit Think It Over is here as well (other Houston hits produced by Zager include Love Is Something That Leads You and Tomorrow), and The Andrea True Connection, from whom we get their 1978 # 56 Hot 100 hit What's Your Name, What's Your Number?
He also produced for Cissy's daughter Whitney (whose first record, Life's A Party and produced by Zager, is here as well), Luther Vandross, Herb Alpert, Deniece Williams, Gladys Knight & The Pips, The Spinners, Joe Williams, Jennifer Holliday, Arturo Sandoval, and Daniel Ray Edwards - which illustrates that his focus extended way beyond Disco. Indeed, he has, to his credit, 13 gold or platinum records, several European accolades, and a Grammy nomination for Cupid/I've Loved You for a Long Time, which became a # 4 Hot 100/# 5 R&B smash for The Spinners in 1980 on Atlantic 3664.
Nor was that the limit of his vast talent as he is probably among the best radio/TV commercial jingle writers around, having done things for such widespread companies as Buick, Budweiser, Crest Toothpaste, Dr Pepper, Maxwell House Coffee, IBM, Kodak and too many more to mention. A graduate of both The University Of Miami and The Mannes College Of Music in New York (where he has also taught), he is a Dorothy F. Schmidt Eminent Scholar in Performing Arts as well as Professor of Music at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, and has written a book entitled Writing Music For Television and Radio Commercials (A Manual for Composers and Students), which is also available through Amazon.
So, all things considered, a nice little volume covering the musical style favoured in the late 1970s/early 1980s and also featuring the vocals of Dollette McDonald, Jolyon Skinner, Alvin Fields, Bill Baker, Ralph Agresta and Tom Cary. Well worth a listen if you're least bit nostalgic about those times.
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